The picture painted by mainstream historians of British propaganda was that the British Propagandists were shy, diffident, reluctant and as seeing propaganda as not being quite the done thing. They had developed a restrained sort of "propaganda lite", based on truth with deception only as a last resort.

In this book Brian Murphy's meticulous reconstruction of the British propaganda war in Ireland in 1920, drives a coach and horses through this comforting and elite-sustaining version of history.